As told through nature
by obedientlittlevictor
Summary: Snippets of the converging lives of Emily Prentiss and Aaron Hotchner. AU backstory.
1. Palm Trees

i. Palm Trees

They meet during what he is convinced is a monsoon in the middle of the day on an island in the Caribbean. She smiles when he sits down at the counter of the bar she's working at and tentatively asks if she speaks English.

"Yes," she laughs, because she does speak English and a half dozen other languages too. "What can I get for you?"

"Are you American?" he blurts out and instantly feels like an idiot. His mind flashes to how long it's been since he's spoken to a woman in a casual setting. Work doesn't count. Haley definitely doesn't count, and the divorce papers with his still-wet signature back in Seattle prove it.

She reaches behind the bar and hands him a clean, dry rag to soak up the raindrops falling from his hair and face. "Yep."

"I am too," he adds.

He still feels dumb, but somehow she makes him feel normal. She's beautiful, of course. Lighter skin than he'd expect from a girl living on an island but it radiates, dark waves trickling down past her breasts, eyes that light up in playfulness. She seems excited to have another American to talk to, a familiar accent that reminds her of home. She won't admit it, but she likes hearing him in particular speak that familiar accent. And she does hear it. All afternoon, and long past closing time.

"So, Aaron, how long are you going to be here?" She asks him and his name on her tongue sounds different and exciting and alluring, just a little bit.

He feels bold and ballsy, and it might be the whiskey he's been drinking, even after she tells him that whiskey isn't an island drink, but he leans in and flashes his best smile that he hopes is kind of sexy.

"Here on this island," he pauses and gives her a wink, "or here with you?"

He wasn't sure what he was expecting, but he's a bit taken aback when she bursts into genuinely happy laughter, he has almost forgotten what that sounds like after the past few unhappy years of his marriage.

She smiles and moves out from behind the counter of the bar. He's a bit self-conscious when he realizes he is the last customer in the bar. She closes the front door and locks it, tossing her long hair over her shoulder. His fingers tingle and he really, really wants to tangle his hands in those dark waves.

"Ever fuck a girl in a bar before?" She asks him innocently, brown eyes wide with what he almost can't believe would be lust. She hops up on the bar countertop and slides in front of him, legs on either side of his body.

He stands and swallows thickly. He's almost completely hard when his hands push up her white skirt.

"Ask me again in an hour, Emily."


	2. La Rose

ii. La Rose

He's not sure what he's expecting from any of this, consider that they had fucked within 10 hours of meeting each other, but they become fast friends. Actual friends. Friends who also just so happen to have wild, outrageously good sex every once in a while. As in every day. Multiple times a day. Any chance they can get, actually.

But he's a divorced man and she's a single woman; he asks just to make sure, since he isn't a homewrecker. So it's all fine. More than fine, really.

She's a firecracker in bed and in their conversations. She's brilliant and witty and can hold her own. She takes no shit and he likes that about her. She's the picture perfect island bartender with her soft flowy skirts and ready smile, but her pierced nipples and black lace panties imply a wilder side of her that he wants to know more about.

They talk for hours on end, mostly at the bar she works at, Kwizin. He has built up ages worth of leave from the FBI, and spending his days in a beachfront bar isn't a bad way to use his vacation time. The owner is a cheery, generous woman from Barbados, Laticia. After a week seeing how many hours he spends there, she tosses him a wet rag and instructs, "Clean table 3," so he does. It's not a bad job, given who his co-worker is.

The days blur together with the backdrop of the infinite ocean and the clear skies and the beautiful woman he's so intrigued with. When they finish closing up the bar every night, they walk hand-in-hand along the beach to her little bungalow.

It's all a huge cliché. It's all too good to last, but they approach three weeks together and he still hasn't heard from the FBI about when he needs to come back, so he pushes his leave for another week and his supervisor grants it.

He thinks he might actually be in love with her. And from the looks he catches on her face, he isn't the only one with those feelings. One night, they curl next to each other on the beach near a makeshift rock fire pit. He looks at her and still finds himself amazed that this dazzling woman could find anything of interest in him.

"Shh. You're thinking too loudly," she murmurs without looking up from her place on his chest.

He drops a kiss to the top of her head and brazenly asks, "Why are you with me? You could have any man on this island. Any man in the world, actually."

He doesn't expect an answer, not after her long silence, but when she turns her head to meet his eyes, he doesn't even try to understand the meaning behind her words.

"You make me forget the worst parts."


	3. And La Marguerite

iii. And La Marguerite

The early morning Caribbean sun is just starting to stream in through the slits of the wooden blinds when she rolls off of him. He quickly follows, trailing after the breathy moan coming from her perfect mouth. She sighs into his demanding kiss and digs her nails into his shoulder. He sometimes thinks that those crescent-shaped marks deserve to be branded into his skin forever so he would never forget her, but then he rolls his eyes. Like he could ever forget her, even if he wanted to.

She might not be permanently etched onto his body, but no one and nothing that came before or will come after her could make him feel like this. He tries to think back, but the feel of her smooth, warm skin against his makes his brain turn to a jellyfish in the flowing ocean waves. He tries to remember if he ever felt this way with Haley. He knows it's cruel, to compare these two women who couldn't be any more different.

He decides that Haley never made him feel so loved, so capable of giving his love. He's never felt so _alive_, except when he's with her. She was right, that night on the beach when she confessed that he made her forget the worst parts. He doesn't know what parts she forgets when she's with him, but when he's with her, the worst of humanity doesn't seem real.

She lets out a light chime of laughter when she pushes his shoulder back again. "We need to get up, Aaron."

He buries his face in her neck and sucks a slight red mark onto the crease between her shoulder blade before she climbs out of bed, shamelessly and gloriously naked.

"But you don't need to work today," he argues. "We could stay in bed all day, all night, all tomorrow morning before we have to go in to the bar."

She just lets out another giggle and throws him his swim trunks from her wicker chair.

"No way, mister. I'm teaching you how to surf today!" She slips on her black bikini bottoms and adjusts the ties on her hips. He stares in fascination at the thin strings holding the piece together. She shimmies into her top and a sundress as he kicks his legs over the side of the bed and pulls on his swim trunks.

"Emily," he starts and he realizes he never wants to stop saying her name. He catches her eye and forces himself to swallow the thick, instinctual hesitation in his throat. "How do you feel about moving back to the States? With me."

She stares, eyes wide with terror like an animal caught in a trap. For as long as he lives, he will never forget her. But he will also never forget the look on her face when she simply says, "No."

He never does learn how to surf.


	4. Big Leaf Maple

iv. Big Leaf Maple

Sometimes when he looks up at the big leaf maple trees towering over everything in the Seattle forest, he thinks of her. More often than not, he's only there at a crime scene or trying to escape his house and his wife and his whole fucking life. The damp and mossy maples of Seattle are nothing compared to the fresh scent of palm trees mingling with the salty ocean breeze through the open windows of her bungalow in St. Lucia.

He tries to think logically, something he has always excelled at. They had a four week whirlwind romance, if it could even be called that. But fuck his logic, he would definitely call it a romance. He had felt something for her, still feels something for her, even as he lies next to his crying wife every night. She means something to him. On the worst nights, he thinks about how he loved her. How he still loves her.

She leaves him the morning after he asks her to take the next step in their relationship, leaves him in her bed without so much as a note. She just up and leaves St. Lucia without a word to him or her bosses at the bar. He doesn't expect that his invitation to come with him back to the United States would have sent her running, but he's been wrong about a lot of things when it come to women he loves. He waits around for two days before he gets a call from Haley, always emotional. He used to love that about Haley, her passion. Towards the end, he just found it annoying.

But Haley tells him over the phone that she's late, that she had originally figured she hadn't had her period because of the stress of the divorce but now she doesn't know, that obviously he's the father, that she doesn't want to take a pregnancy test without him there. She never filed the divorce papers after all.

So he leaves a letter for her at the bar, begging any god who's listening that she would somehow magically appear back on the island and read it. It's just words, but it means something. All of this has to mean something. The flight back to Seattle is dreadful at best, agonizing at worst, but at least he's alone and can pretend that he doesn't cry in the airplane bathroom.

As luck would have it, and yes he considered it luck, Haley is wrong. She's not pregnant. He stays with her anyway, mostly out of guilt from her crushed excitement about having his child.

When his boss tells him that he's up for a promotion to Unit Chief of the Behavioral Analysis Unit in Washington, D.C., he wishes he could tell her. His first instinct is to want to tell _Emily_, not his wife.

And that say a lot about him.


	5. Ocean

v. Ocean

She gets shot the night that he asks her to move back to the States with him. Because that's just how it goes; isn't her life so funny? She would laugh, as if she found any humor in it. She finally finds a man she is genuinely interested in, genuinely compatible with, and _of course_ it would be while she's on an undercover mission.

The shot is just a through-and-though in her upper thigh, missing her femoral artery by inches and doing nothing but inconveniencing her. She argues when her handler Michael tells her that she can't go back to her bungalow, can't go back to Aaron, because _goddammit Emily you have a fucking fresh bullet wound_. She can't even walk without using a crutch and even that is with intense pain, so any hopes of undetected escape from her security detail are dashed, and she's been really good at escaping security details since her childhood.

Her mission is over. Terrorists are dead. The good guys won yet again, thanks to the intel that she gathered undercover at the bar and her sharp shooting even while she's bleeding out on a terrorist's floor and the perfect timing of the tactical team bursting through the doors to take out any threats before they can take her out.

But none of that seems to matter when she gets on the plane back to London. As she flies over the Atlantic Ocean, all she sees is Aaron's face. There's only a sliver of moonlight and the waves below her look black. She wants to get swallowed up by the ocean.

None of this is fair. But she does what she does best and compartmentalizes this part of her life as something glorious and perfect and untouchable. She moves on. Or at least tries to. She fails, actually.

Her success in the St. Lucia mission gets her a hefty pay raise and a few weeks of leave time so that her leg can heal. She spends most of it trying to learn everything she can about Aaron. She'd known his last name since their first morning together when he chuckled nervously and said he'd never done this before and made a joke about how he didn't even know her last name. She still isn't sure why she gave him her real last name, but he gave her his last name too and she utilizes that information liberally on her leave. She's in the intelligence gathering industry, and she _really_ uses her skills.

She learns about his offer at the Behavioral Analysis Unit probably before he does and she lets out a curse. The BAU handles terrorism cases every once in awhile. So does her Interpol black-ops anti-terrorism unit. The only hope is that her cases don't take her to the U.S.

She doesn't think she can face him again.


	6. Cornfields

vi. Cornfields

"No fucking way," Michael murmurs and lets out a low whistle at the CCTV footage from the latest crime scene. "Isn't that your boy from St. Lucia?"

Emily bites back the acidic remark on the tip of her tongue when her handler pauses and zooms in on the video feed of the FBI team handling the initial scene. One quick enhanced photo still later, she's looking straight at Aaron, six months later and somehow a million years older. He looks like he holds the weight of the world on his shoulders and she instinctively feels overwhelmed with guilt. She knows it can't all be her fault, but she's not naive enough to think she didn't contribute to his current state.

"Michael, we're hunting a terrorist, not speculating about old flings," she grinds out, but the irregular flutter in her heartbeat demands that she reminisce. She hasn't spoken to him, hasn't attempted to contact him and explain her disappearance, because what's the point? She has a job to do and it takes her around the world more than a real relationship could handle.

Michael glances at her and must see something because he shuts up and gets back to work. They are hunting a terrorist. And apparently so is the FBI Behavioral Analysis Unit. Exactly what she didn't want to happen.

After her medical leave ends, she gets her pick of missions because her bosses feel sorry for the still-healing puckered bullet scar on her thigh but also because she's really good, as they all had seen with St. Lucia. She doesn't think she can ever really move on, but she does what she always does and throws herself into her professional life. She chooses a terrorist-hunting mission that takes her from Cork to Dublin to Iowa, of all places. So here she is now, on a quick rotation stateside in the same fucking city as Aaron Hotchner, doing the same fucking job, searching for the same fucking terrorist who's blowing up grain silos and city hall buildings and banks in rural areas.

The terrorist they're hunting must have a thing against corn.

"Command said we need to reach out to the BAU," Emily breaks the silence. Michael cocks his head as he looks at her and goddammit now she understands why he's so good undercover, because he clearly can read everyone like a book.

"I'll go, Em," he offers with a slightly apologetic smile. "Haven't played with the FBI boys in a while. Hope they don't mind Interpol getting involved."

When Michael goes to share information with the FBI, she listens in on the audio bug Michael is wearing; they can share information, but that doesn't mean the Agencies trust each other.

The second she hears Aaron's voice and all of the strain that it holds, she runs to the trashcan to puke up her guilt.


	7. Meadow

vii. Meadow

It's a serial child abduction case that finally brings them together, the kidnappings of fifteen girls ages two to seven years old, one of which is the daughter of a French diplomat. That's what puts Emily on the case. She goes undercover as a human trafficker, a potential buyer of the girl. Definitely not her favorite cover. But she does it, because this is her job and what else does she have?

She's in a seedy dungeon of a D.C. bar wearing a dress that's too tight and perfume that's too heady, smoking a cigar and waiting for her contact to drive her to where the girls are being held, so she can _inspect the merchandise_. Her contact is a rough middle-aged man who looks like he really enjoys his job. He blindfolds her and guides her to the backseat of his car. He doesn't say anything on the ride to the inspection point, and neither does she.

When the car stops, he helps her out of the car like a gentleman and takes off her blindfold. They're at an underground compound hidden in a meadow, no place for young girls. She saunters in like she owns the fucking place, because that's the only way she can do this job. If she pretends that she has full control of the situation, then maybe she can convince herself and everyone else that she actually does.

"Mademoiselle Evelyne Sauveterre, I presume?" For a human trafficker, Mikhail Katz is surprisingly well-dressed. He's flanked by six men with automatic rifles.

"_Oui_," she answers with her perfect French accent. "Skip the pleasantries. The girl?"

"How I love a woman who knows what she wants," the scumbag says. She doubts he likes women at all. "You wanted a specific _model_, which I usually don't allow, but for such a large sum of money as you're offering, I couldn't say no."

"Good. I have plans for the little one," she says and her lips curl into something evil. "A diplomat's daughter can serve helpful purposes."

He leads her down a hall of cages, twenty in total, to the last one where the three year old girl is cowering in the corner on a tiny cot.

"She's fresh and clean for you," Katz announces proudly and unlocks the cage to pull her out into the hall. The girl instantly starts crying. "Usually these are full," he gestures to the other cages, "but not when buyers are here."

The smoke bomb comes first. When she hears _his_ voice – and of course it would be _him _– she knows that she is well and truly screwed. These men are professional human traffickers. They don't bend to law enforcement interrogation tactics. They take their secrets to the grave.

"FBI! Hands in the air!"

Fourteen girls are still missing. At this rate, secrets wouldn't be the only things going to the grave.


	8. Grassland

viii. Grassland

Supervisory Special Agent Aaron Hotchner rarely takes point, usually having the tactical team hit the ground first then following. But this case has grated on his nerves and his sanity for weeks. They finally have a lead, a possible location where the fifteen girls are being held.

He gears up like he did when he was SWAT and throws a smoke bomb down the stairs, praying that the girls are here so this nightmare can just end. Derek Morgan taps his right shoulder to alert him that the team is ready to charge in.

"FBI! Hands in the air!"

The goal is to do this without any shots being fired, but that plan goes to hell when he hears a gunshot and the sickening sound of a bullet tearing through flesh. It's not his body, though, and not Derek's, because he's the one that pushes them forward. Their tactical lenses allow them to see through the smoke and it gives them an advantage, but it still seems like ages before they have the seven men restrained.

He's convinced that his eyes are playing tricks on him because in the back corner of a cage is Emily, dressed like a high-end escort and shielding a girl behind her. He gets close enough for her to hiss, "Arrest me!"

So he does. He doesn't know what the fuck is going on, but he tackles her to the cement floor and recites the Miranda rights as she shrieks at him in French. When they clear the entire compound and the only girl there is Lisette Geroux, he jerks Emily away from the FBI van full of human traffickers and forces her against the side of his Chevy Suburban parked in the grass. His team can handle the scene; his only concern right now is her.

"Why are you here?" Deep down, he knows the answer before he asks the question, but hearing her confirm it makes his stomach church.

"I'm undercover trying to locate these missing girls," she whispers, then struggles against him until he slams both hands against her shoulders. He knows that it's all for show, so she can keep her cover.

"Which Agency?"

"Interpol." She wishes she could explain everything to him, how the only place she feels like she actually belongs is in the field, on missions. She wants to tell him everything about her past. She wants to apologize and beg for his forgiveness. She keeps silent instead.

"How long?"

She doesn't know if he means how long she's been working this case or how long she's been with Interpol. She says the simplest answer. "A French diplomat's daughter was taken. That's why I'm here."

"Lisette, I know," he states. "She's the only girl we recovered here."

"Well, fuck."

"You're working with us now." He leaves no room to argue when he opens the car door and pushes her inside.


	9. Spring Water

ix. Spring Water

"SSA Derek Morgan," the agent introduces himself and holds out his hand to help her out of the SUV. He looks at her suspiciously, but doesn't voice his concerns. "Hotch said you speak French. Didn't say much else. We need you to translate."

Derek guides her to the ambulance where Aaron and the paramedics are trying to calm frantic Lisette Geroux and passes her his FBI jacket when he notices her thin dress against the D.C. nighttime chill, clearly a gentleman.

"She keeps saying she doesn't know how to swim," she tells Aaron and Derek in a soothing tone for Lisette's benefit then takes the girl in her lap. She continues rocking Lisette still sobbing in French about water and glances at Aaron, who hasn't taken his eyes off of her. "Mon petit chou, voulez-vous rentrer à la maison?"

"Did Katz say anything that would—" Aaron starts, but she cuts him off.

"Water! Get me a map of the area. Morgan, here. Hold her." She tells Lisette in French to stay with her friend Derek, and passes the girl over to the other agent.

"What are you thinking, Em?" Aaron says quietly as they jog to the FBI SUV and find a map of the property.

"Drive, start driving," she orders him and they climb in to the SUV together. To his credit, he just starts the car and pulls away from the scene. "Turn left off this main road."

"There's a secondary location," he fills in.

"Lisette's saying she doesn't want to drown. There's a freshwater stream at the edge of the property," she offers. "They must be kept there. Katz said that the cages were full _except_ when buyers are here."

It's by complete accident that they find the second compound, another underground hellhole. She trips over the cellar handle, sure enough, right next to the stream on the property. He goes down first because he's armed but she follows quickly. She hesitates to think it, but they work well together.

She feels like she's going to cry when she sees the group of girls trembling against the back wall.

"Hey, hey," he murmurs and holsters his weapon, hands in the air like he's approaching wounded animals. Three of the girls scream. She grabs his bicep and pulls him back.

"They were held by men. All men," she whispers, referring to the traffickers. "Go update your team. Send only female agents and paramedics down here."

He leaves her alone with thankfully all 14 girls. She steps closer and kneels a few feet in front of the group. "Hey, there. It's okay. We're the police, the good guys. We're going to take you home to your mommies and daddies, okay?"

One of the younger ones shoots out from behind an older girl and throws her arms around Emily's neck.

"It's okay, sweetheart. You're going home."


	10. Coffee Beans

x. Coffee Beans

"You were good with them," he says as he approaches her and gestures at the children reuniting with their parents. She's standing back, toying with the edge of Derek Morgan's FBI jacket and waiting for her handler to call her back. Her mission is over, but she claims she needs more time to ensure everything at the scene is handled.

"Thank you," she replies quietly, her voice thick with tears of joy.

"This is the best part of the job. Why we all suffer through the hellish nightmares from these cases," he adds and she swears his eyes are shining with tears too.

It's rare that she gets to witness the good that she is doing, the reasons why she does the things she does, the justification for all the sins she's committed. He's right. It feels amazing. She doesn't get enough of it at Interpol. She does good work, challenging work, but it doesn't have this kind of gratification.

"Emily, have you eaten dinner?"

She raises an eyebrow curiously, "Are you trying to get me to go on a date with you?"

"I'm not trying to take you out and–"

"And fuck me?" She interrupts and is graced with a hint of his smile. She misses his smile. It doesn't seem like he smiles enough either.

"I have no intention of doing that," he lets out a chuckle, carefully avoiding the topic of sex. He doesn't think she knows that he's still married, and he's definitely not going to bring it up. His marriage to Haley may be a sham, but he will never be unfaithful as a married man. Knowingly married, anyway. "I just want to talk to you. I think there's a lot that we need to tell each other."

She nods in agreement, then grabs a notepad and pen from the nearest FBI technician's hand, who just sputters until she returns the items.

"Here, um, my phone number," she adds and thrusts the paper into his hands. "I'll be in D.C. for a few more days to unwind. Forced vacation time thanks to the higher-ups, you know. I have a place in Georgetown. There's a really good coffee shop nearby, if you want coffee."

"I usually prefer tea," he corrects gently, and she marvels at how she had lived with him for a month and didn't notice. "But I'll choke down some coffee beans with you."

He still manages to bring a smile to her face. Damn, she's in deep. "I have to go, but call me?"

"I will," he says earnestly. "I want to work this all out, Emily. I know it's not the same, it's not some carefree fling, but there's still something between us. I'm not saying we need to address that now, but I think we need to reconcile all this."

"We need honesty."


	11. Lilac Freesia

xi. Lilac Freesia

It's past midnight when her handler slides a manila folder across the table in her D.C. apartment, obviously urgent since he seldom makes house calls.

"You're being transferred to Interpol's Joint Task Force 12, starting at oh-five hundred. Sorry for the late notice and for cancelling your vacation. You report to Clyde Easter. Teammates are Tsia Mosely, Sean McAllister, and Jeremy Wolff. Former British SIS, French DCRI, German BND. You're in good hands."

"What's my mission?" She's well aware that it's a highly prestigious assignment.

"You're going under as an arms dealer, long-term. You're an exact match to the type of women that our IRA terrorist fancies. Beautiful, brunette, dangerous. Your mission is to get close to Ian Doyle, codename Valhalla, develop a relationship with him, learn about his operations, and bring him down," Michael sighs apprehensively. "Using any and all means necessary."

She opens the folder and examines the documents of her new life. _Lauren Reynolds_. 32 years old. As closely aligned to her real life as possible, as is protocol for extended missions, making the transition to undercover life smoother.

She's been on undercover missions before, but nothing more than a few months, and even with those, she had consistent contact with her handler. When Michael says long-term, she knows it could mean years, likely isolated. Long-term undercover missions can't be jeopardized by contact with anyone from an agent's previous life. She knows she has to shed everything about Emily Prentiss to become Lauren Reynolds.

Her debrief ends and Michael leaves her with a kiss on the cheek and a wish of good luck. He tells her it's been an honor working with her, and she tries not to take it as a farewell that he'll never seen her again. She promises to be safe and he promises to be there if she needs him.

She's looking around the apartment that she'll soon have to give up when her phone rings with a DC number she doesn't recognize. She knows exactly who is calling. She lets it go to voicemail.

Aaron Hotchner deserves better. He deserves so much better than anything she could ever give him.

Plus, Emily Prentiss doesn't exist anymore. There's only Lauren Reynolds. And Lauren Reynolds doesn't love FBI agents. Lauren Reynolds loves weapons and danger and, soon enough, an IRA terrorist with shockingly blue eyes, an Irish accent, and an innocent son.

She calls him at his office phone in the middle of the night when she knows he isn't there.

"Aaron, I'm sorry. This, us...never would have worked. I know I said we needed honesty, but honesty isn't something that comes easy in my line of work. Take care of yourself."

It's not fair, but this is her life. After every sin she's committed, what else does she deserve?


	12. Cherry Blossoms

xii. Cherry Blossoms

When he sees her in his office, he thinks of cherry blossoms. It's nowhere near cherry blossom season in D.C., but she has them tattooed low on her left hip. He remembers them vividly, all too clearly in his dreams, even four years later. He remembers the skin that he tasted, trailing kisses from the vibrantly-colored cherry blossoms on her hip leading lower down her body.

"They remind me of my favorite city," she had explained to him as he mindlessly traced his fingers over the petals when they were on the beach one morning. "Moving around a lot, I got to see a lot of breath-taking places. But D.C. cherry blossoms in the springtime always stood out as the most beautiful. My favorite happy memory."

Now she's standing there in the center of his office, looking like a bona fide FBI agent in a professional navy dress shirt tucked into her gray skirt. Her hair is short and straight, compared to her long waves from years ago. He can't help but wonder if it's still as soft.

She meets his eyes as he walks around to the other side of his desk, a blatant power move. He might be imagining it, but he swears there's a look of sadness there. She has no right, since she's the one that walked away. Twice.

"Agent Hotchner," she greets formally and extends her arm for a proper handshake.

"What can I do for you?" He doesn't mean for that to come out as short as it does. He really should work on being more hospitable. Maybe next time.

"Uh, well, I guess I was hoping you could tell me where to put my stuff," she stammers out and it's the complete opposite of the calm and collected woman he remembers. But when his brain finally catches up to her words, he can only tilt his head in confusion.

"I'm sorry?"

"I'm supposed to start here. Today. At the BAU," she clarifies slowly, attempting to cover the doubt etched across her face with a friendly smile. She presents a file folder to him and he flips through it without reading a word.

"There's been a mistake." Those words couldn't be any more true. Everything involving her has been a mistake.

Her face falls for a split second before her fiery defiance gets the best of her. "I don't think so, sir."

"No, there's definitely been a mistake." He doesn't give her time to explain before JJ knocks on his door for their next case.

"I didn't approve this transfer, Agent Prentiss," because that's who she is to him now. "I'm sorry for the confusion, but you've been misinformed. It's been very good to see you again."

As he heads out the door, he takes some sick pleasure in being the one to walk away this time.


	13. Lowlands

xiii. Lowlands

She's officially assigned to the BAU for all of twenty minutes when he calls her from the empty bullpen.

"Close the door, Agent Prentiss," he orders her. She does a great job of hiding the wince at the hardness in his voice, light years different from his sweet, gentle tones in her dreams.

"Your resume is bullshit," he says by way of introduction, then tosses the file across the table to her. "You worked in the _Midwest _field offices? St. Louis, Chicago?"

She doesn't respond or even glance at the paperwork. Clyde Easter did a bang-up job of putting together her fake dossier, a list of references and cases that she's supposedly worked as she began her career with the FBI. Just not good enough to fool him.

"It's funny because I distinctly remember a case involving 15 missing girls where you said you were with Interpol. Tell me why a Midwest field agent would go undercover on a high profile case with a foreign intelligence agency."

The Lisette Geroux case. She wonders if Morgan will bring it up too. She racks her brain for a plausible explanation, but he continues as if her response wouldn't matter anyway.

"I'm supposed to trust you with the lives of my team when I don't even know what your _actual_ employment history is?" he asks, his voice eerily calm. "I'm supposed to trust you when you've never once told me the whole truth?"

"Is this really about trust? Because I trusted you when you said you weren't married back in Lucia," she shoots back, her rediscovered voice laced with caustic acid. He visibly recoils at that comment. She knows it's a below the belt shot, but she won't be treated as a second-tier agent.

"That's not fair. I signed my divorce papers before I met you."

"And I was assigned to a different mission both of the times I left. I had a job to do. A job I did willingly and well. I had to walk away–"

"_Had_ to walk away? No one forced you," he snarls.

"You can't even begin to understand the shit that I've done for this country," she laughs mirthlessly.

"Feel free to enlighten me."

"Classified. Half of what I did isn't even on record." She's a bit surprised that she offers that detail. She rushes out her next words to keep from revealing her secrets.

"Now if you want me to prove my skill and capability as a member of your team, I am more than happy to train hand-to-hand combat or marksmanship with you. Hell, quiz me on the fucking FBI handbook, but I will not stand for you looking at me as if I can't be trusted to perform competently as a member of this team."

He stares at her and it scares her that she can't read him anymore.


	14. The Bay

xiv. The Bay

* * *

It's her first official case and of course she's in the roundtable room before him. She's wearing a fucking pantsuit, of all things, when he and the rest of the team walk in. He watches for a look of discomfort with Morgan, because Morgan was there four years ago in that godforsaken underground bunker.

Deep down, he thinks he wants to see her crash and burn. She barely stumbles as she stands to shake Morgan's hand and introduce herself, smile plastered on her face like an excited new friend.

Morgan doesn't blink at the new addition to the team, but he knows the man well enough to know he won't trust her automatically. No, she has to earn that. But if Morgan doesn't recognize her from the Lisette Geroux case now, it's possible he never will.

If they weren't hunting terrorists, he would have considered trying to make it worse for her.

"We can make nice later," he cuts off instead, ever the professional. "What do we know?"

The rest of the team discusses the case, and he's not surprised when she jumps right in and contributes her endless knowledge.

She astonishes the team with her Arabic, but he knows Gideon is going to be more difficult to impress. She already knows she has to prove herself, and dammit if she doesn't do just that.

Gideon is still hesitant to take her to Guantanamo Bay with him and Reid, but it turns out to be unnecessary reluctance, because she helps crack the case wide open. They take down the terrorists just like they're supposed to.

They walk through the door after flying back from Gitmo, and he can already tell that Gideon accepts her and Reid is nothing short of smitten with her. There's a lot to admire about her, he has to admit. She handles herself well out in the field, even for a new profiler.

Gideon closes the door to his office, presumably to continue working for the rest of the night. Even he doesn't know what Gideon does most of the time since he doesn't have a family or anyone resembling friends outside of work. He wonders if he will end up like Gideon, because he has nothing and no one to come home to either.

It isn't the worst thing, he tries to tell himself when his house creaks at night and he is truly and utterly alone. The worst thing, he thinks, is coming home to a life he hates. He's had too much of that to consider going back.

"You did good work today," he says simply from his place at the top of the stairs. She looks up from her desk without a hint of urgency.

"Thank you, sir," she replies and he wants to laugh at her formality.

"Report at oh-six hundred for marksmanship training."

"Yes, sir."

And so it begins.


	15. Fire

xv. Fire

He gets to the range at oh-five thirty with the intention of being there before her. Of course she's there before him, though, as he realizes when her quick burst of five bullets sprays down the range before he gets a chance to put on his ear protection.

"Fuck!" She exclaims and immediately unloads her Glock 17 when she notices the door slam behind him. "Shit, I'm so sorry. I didn't see you there."

He shakes his head as if that would help him restore his temporarily-damaged hearing. She approaches him and raises her hand before dropping it uselessly. He notices that she doesn't get any closer than what would be considered a professional distance.

"My fault. I didn't realize you were going to be here so early." He's nothing if not observant, and he notes the three paper targets with their centers blown out next to her bag at the shooting lane she's been using. The target clipped at 15 yards is littered with bullet holes straight through center mass.

"Yeah, I thought I would get some extra practice in before your evaluation of my skills," she says and clears her throat almost nervously despite her brazen words.

He knows he's been harsh on her, downright mean at times, if he's being honest with himself. The glares that JJ sends him when he's less than friendly to her don't go unnoticed. Since it doesn't seem like she's going to be leaving any time soon, he figures he should try to clear the air. In a poorly-designed attempt at a joke, he gestures at the used targets and mutters, "They noticed."

She benefits him with a small smile and a light laugh, then shakes out her right hand. "My hand did too."

"How many magazines have you gone through?" He's genuinely curious. And it's an easier question than asking how early she got to the office. Far easier than asking who and what she has when goes home at night.

"Five or six, I guess," she lies and steps back into her booth. She slips her shooting ear muffs back on.

He steps up to the lane next to her and loads his own paper target onto the hanger then sends it down range at the same distance as hers. Her shooting abilities really are impressive. He's beginning to doubt the necessity of asking to meet her at the range. He hasn't thought it through before now. Her ability to shoot isn't just a back-up plan as a law enforcement agent. It might be the only thing that kept her alive on her undercover missions.

"Are you good?" She pops her head back behind the lane divider between them and cocks her eyebrow in an almost sassy way. She's confident and has ever right to be. She might just be better than him.

"Fire away."


	16. Mudslide

xvi. Mudslide

It turns out that Penelope Garcia is her blessed savior and provider of everything she wants to know but couldn't ask, because one night, after a few too many Mudslide cocktails, Garcia giggles and leans in and whispers, "So, who do you think is hotter, Hotch or Derek?"

JJ lets out a loud bark of laughter and leans dangerously far back on her bar stool. "Just thinking about Derek's muscles gets me off! But Hotch has that dark, brooding, mysterious thing about him. Seriously, the man went on a month-long beach vacation a few years back and somehow came back worse than when he left?"

Weeks into her new position and she is still trying to get used to hearing them call him _Hotch_. She's still trying to get used to her new life. Unbeknownst to JJ or Garcia, the reason he came back worse is sitting with them.

She takes a sip of her too-sweet drink and pretends to be drunker than she is when she slurs, "Isn't Hotch married? I swore I heard that redhead from the third floor lamenting that he was married."

She means for the comment to bring a few giggles from Garcia and JJ, but suddenly the mood turns somber. She catches on quickly, like she always does, like she's been trained to do. "Or not?"

Garcia clears her throat and lowers her voice. "Hotch _was_ married. He was together with his wife Haley for like 20 years, since high school. Haley died in a car crash, kind of, last year. She was drunk and there was a sharp turn in the road. They found her car at the bottom of that cliff. They still don't know if it was suicide or not."

That was not even in the top ten scenarios that she had expected to hear. She knows that he had been legally married back in St. Lucia. Given, she didn't know it until after she had been discharged from her mission there, but she learned that his divorce had begun its early proceedings then.

She didn't feel bad for what they did. Now she does. She feels sick. She didn't bother keeping tabs on Aaron Hotchner after she left D.C. with only a late-night voicemail to his work phone to go on that shitshow of the Doyle mission.

Garcia must see the despondent look on her face, so she takes her hand, as touchy-feely as usual, and she soothes, "It's not your fault, you didn't know."

"No, no, you're right," she agrees. She didn't know. She doesn't know what she's supposed to do with this information, but more than anything, she wants to wrap him in her arms and promise to never leave him. But that would probably end up being a lie; she doesn't have a good track record for sticking around.

No wonder he hates her.


	17. Wheat

xvii. Wheat

The video appears on all of Garcia's screens and she shrieks before she can even process that her system has been hacked. Reid has the wherewithal to call the team into the room.

It's Emily. Emily, who has been missing for three days because of this huge disaster of a case. Emily, who _looks _like she's been missing for three days. Bruises and cuts mar lily white skin, all of the skin that they can see from her shredded tank top hanging off her shoulder. Her hair is a greasy, tangled mess and her left eye is swollen shut.

But she's alive. She's alive and the ragged, wheezing breaths she's desperate to take in are proof enough of that.

Morgan and JJ are the first to sprint into the room, nearly tripping over each other to see the video feed. Gideon is right on their heels, and he follows immediately after Gideon, phone already in hand to type an order to Tech to trace the source of the video and an alert to Strauss.

"Hotch?" It's JJ's small voice, something terrified that he's never heard from her in all their years together, that gets him to snap out of his tunnel vision locked on Emily's unnaturally slumped head. The team takes a collective breath when a masked figure enters the shaky, dark frames and yanks back Emily's hair to expose her bloody neck for the blade in his hand.

"Say it," the disembodied voice orders and forces Emily's face toward the camera.

"I am FBI Special Agent Emily Prentiss, and I am going to be sold to the highest bidder at exactly midnight tonight." She takes a deep breath and uses what seems like all her energy to keep her one eye locked on the camera. "Aaron Hotchner, this is all your fault."

It's as if all of the oxygen in his lungs, in this room, in the world, disappears. He would have crumbled into a ball of guilt and self-loathing if the team hadn't been there to watch his disintegration. Kevin calls at that moment and he doesn't even greet the other man before he reports, "The video can't be traced, Agent Hotchner. It's bouncing all over the world and the second that I can get a read on one location it's already at another and–"

He mindlessly passes the phone to Morgan when he notices her hands. Rapid, calculated actions of her fingers.

"Her hands," he murmurs aloud. Her fingers are bloodied and missing nails, but they don't stop moving.

"Sign language!" The first to catch on, Reid exhales angrily. "I don't know it."

She had taught it to him in St. Lucia, just spelling the alphabet with their fingers. It was their convenient way of communicating from across the room when they were at the bar together. He still remembers the movements.

"Wheat thresher?"


	18. Moonlight

xviii. Moonlight

They manage to trace her location by farms with wheat threshers. Miraculously, only one was registered in the kill zone, and they take it quickly. They find Emily tied up and barely conscious in a barn on the outskirts of West Virginia.

"You remembered," she breathes just before her legs give out and she collapses limp in his arms. Of course he remembers. He remembers everything about her.

He orders JJ to ride with her to the hospital and he handles the rest of the scene, but as soon as everything is in order, he relieves JJ of her duties as Emily's guardian.

The moon streaming through the hospital blinds hit her in just the right way to make him nostalgic for nights past in another life when he watched her sleep.

"Hotch?" Her voice cracks and he passes her a cup of water. "How long have you been here?"

"Long enough," he answers, then tries for an encouraging expression. "You pulled one hell of a stunt back there."

"I didn't know if the camera was even panned out far enough to see my hands," she confesses. She won't make direct eye contact and it worries him.

"You're safe," he reassures her, and he sees that she really needs it. "It was smart thinking, saying that you blamed me so it would grab my attention."

She turns her lip up in an apologetic smile. "I figured if there was one person who would catch on, it's you. Maybe Reid, but if the video hadn't shown my hands, he wouldn't have known how to take it. He'd misinterpret it, and then I'd die, then he'd blame himself."

He doesn't have the energy to even try to cover his feelings, not this late, and not after this much stress trying to find her. "Reid isn't the only one who'd have blamed himself if you died."

Her head whips up and her gaze on him is fiery intense. He matches her look with a raise of his chin, defiant and daring her to take his words to heart.

"I know," she says the words with care and gentleness, but a solid resolve underneath. She knows what he's meaning to say.

"I'm sorry I wasn't with you when you woke up here," he rushes out the apology.

"You had a job to do," she says with a shrug. "I know what that's like."

"Prentiss," he starts and doesn't quite know where to begin with all he needs to say. All he would never have said to her if she had died in that dilapidated barn at the hands of a serial killer. But she's just been tortured, and the last thing she needs is to revisit old emotions.

"You're too smart to die like that," he says instead.

She counters him, "My team's too smart to let me die like that."


	19. Sunlight

xix. Sunlight

He shows up at her apartment door with ibuprofen and soup from her favorite Thai restaurant. She answers the door in shorts and a tank top, incredibly underdressed to his suit.

"Just wanted to check up on you," he clears his throat.

She thanks him, ushers him to her kitchen, and suddenly has no idea what to do. He clearly doesn't either. She notices his effort to focus on her eyes instead of the rest of her beaten body.

"I'm fine, Hotch," she soothes.

"You were tortured, Emily." It's the use of her first name that makes her heartbeat quicken.

"Everything's mostly healed. Look."

She knows exactly what she's doing when she lifts her shirt to expose the white bandage covering her left ribs. She takes the bandage off and the wound still looks bad a week later. Her shorts ride low enough that her tattoo is visible.

He steps closer to her and reaches for her hip. That's his first mistake because the electricity from so many years ago is still there, still pulsing. He had forgotten how soft her skin is.

She feels it too when she intertwines their fingers on her hip and readjusts the bandage to cover the wound. Her body is on fire and her breathing isn't quite right.

"Tell me to leave," he whispers, right there, right in her space.

How's she supposed to tell him to leave when he's everything she needs in this moment?

He swallows thickly and removes his hand when he mistakes her dumbstruck silence for malaise.

"No," she breathes and places his hand back on her hip, mindful of her injuries, and skims her hand down his chest. He pulls her against his body.

"_This _isn't because I've been worried about you," he murmurs into her hair. "This is because I want you. I've wanted you since the moment I first saw you."

"I know," she gasps and it's harder to breathe but that's irrelevant because he's in her arms again.

"Do you want this, Emily? This isn't St. Lucia. There are consequences. I'm your superior," he pulls back to stare intensely into her eyes. "I don't just want a month-long fling. I want to give this relationship an honest try. If you want something else, tell me to leave right now."

She steps out of his embrace and his face falls so much that it breaks her heart. She reaches for his hand and guides him to the couch.

"We aren't sleeping together tonight," she explains. "You and I have too much to discuss. Too much history, too much unexplained past. If we're going to do this, we're going to do it right."

His smile is one of relief and unconstrained happiness.

"I need to tell you about Interpol. Everything," she starts.

They don't stop until the sun is peaking over the horizon.


End file.
